With the Perfect World Masters Group Stage now having officially come to a close, the stage is now set for the week-long double elimination playoff round for the eight remaining teams who made it through.

As is expected, the end of the Perfect World Masters Group Stage came with its fair share of surprises and disappointments. None more so than Team Kinguin coming out of nowhere to take the lead in Group B while LGD Gaming fell into last place and were eliminated from the tournament.

The Brazilians, SG e-sports, also faced yet another disappointment with a last-place finish. This is the 4th time in a row this season that they failed to make it to the playoffs of a Pro Circuit LAN.

Vici Gaming and LFY Top Group A

After sweeping CompLexity Gamingand splitting their series against SG e-sports in Day 1 of the Perfect World Masters Group Stage,LFYstarted the day off right with a 2-0 sweep over Vici Gaming. However, much like in Day 1, LFY would fail to capitalize on an easy matchup, scoring a draw against Vega Squadron.

Coincidentally enough, the draw against LFY literally gave Vega Squadrontheir 1st point of the tournament, which after sweeping SG e-sports to end the day gave them 4 points and secured their berth in the playoffs. But it did not come easy, as the Brazilians nearly forced a tiebreaker when Game 2 between the two teams came down to a base race.

Adriano de Paula ‘4dr‘ Machado and his Medusa gave Vega Squadron fits as the game went late. However, the CIS Sharks simply had too much firepower with Sergey ‘G‘ Bragin on Outworld Devourer and Ilya ‘ALOHADANCE‘ Korobkin on his six-slotted Gyrocopter leading the way.

Vici Gaming, meanwhile, bounced back from their earlier loss to LFY with a quick 2-0 drubbing of CompLexity Gaming to retain the lead in Group A with 9 points, which was 1 more than that of LFY.

Who would’ve thought that at the end of the Perfect World Masters Group Stage, Team Kinguinwould stand on top of the so-called “group of death”?

Lumped up with the likes of Mineski, Team Secret, LGD Gamingand Newbee, the All-Polish squad of Team Kinguin had the odds stacked up against them. But, while others would simply give up and concede, the former Let’s Do It squad gathered themselves and split all of their series save for their matchup against Team Secret, who they swept to put themselves on top of Group B.

While Team Kinguin are all smiles are now, the same most likely can’t be said for LGD Gaming.

After splitting their series against Newbee, LGD Gaming, who recently welcomed back Chen ‘Victoria‘ Guanhong to their lineup, would fall 2-0 against Mineski. As a result of that particular matchup and Team Secret sweeping Newbee to end the day, the PGL Open Bucharest Grand Finalists could only muster up 3 points, which meant that they would not be advancing to the playoffs.

At the end of the day, Team Kinguin topped Group B with 6 points while Newbee, Vici Gaming, and Team Secret all finished with 5 points each.

Are You Ready for the Playoffs?

The Perfect World Masters Group Stage has been a revelation so far. Many have lauded the organiser’s decision to stretch the entire over a week, as well as include a proper group stage and have more than eight teams participate.

With that said, however, the playoffs are set to be even better.

The eight playoff teams will take a much-needed day off tomorrow as they prepare for the main event. They will all return to play again starting on Wednesday, November 22 at 10:00 SGT (03:00 CET) with the upper-bracket BO3 semifinals.